I commented in my review of Walk the Wire (the last book in this series) that I felt Baldacci made things a little too convoluted. But the interpersonal dynamic between Decker and White is just as interesting as the solution to the murders, which doesn’t come easily . There’s a hint things might change for Decker in terms of his health and I liked Freddie, so look forward to seeing what comes next. The crowd here was large; Earl and Mary Lancaster were well-known and well-liked, and Sandy had made many friends at her school. A suited Decker, usually comfortable only in jeans or wrinkled khakis and a loose sweatshirt, stared down at the eternal berth-to-be in the ground.

If you enjoy an old-school thriller with a detective hunting the bad guys, that has no psychological twists and does not try to trick the reader, you can stop looking here and do no better than picking this one up. The disease had spiraled continually downward, as her brain deteriorated and dragged the rest of her along with it.That these easter eggs are meaningless and even befuddling to new readers might make sense in terms of costs and benefits. Once, when he had been here visiting his dead family, a dying man named Meryl Hawkins had wandered out of the woods and demanded justice from Decker, in connection with the first case Decker had worked as a homicide detective. He put his suitcase down inside the door of his apartment, and tore open the letter with his thick finger. He glanced once at the trash can where the destroyed letter rested and then grabbed his car keys and walked out the door.

As always, we dig into Decker's personal backstory, perhaps even more so than in the other books, as events keep bringing painful memories back to him.His old boss at the FBI, Ross Bogart, had retired and was learning to play golf—badly, he had heard—in Arizona.

S. Geological Survey, leading to “immediate suspension of the National Volcano Early Warning System,” and there’s always someone around looking to monetize the natural disaster and the sasquatch-y onslaught that follows.There came another lengthy pause where all Decker could hear was the woman’s breaths and then a sob that was so dry and drawn out it sounded like she was strangling. The case - a judge and her bodyguard murdered together - seems simple at first, but Decker and White quickly realise that nothing is as simple as it seems as they get drawn into a web of intrigues spanning the whole of Florida and going back over generations. He is in crisis following the suicide of a close friend and receipt of a letter concerning a personal issue which could change his life forever. He sat there as his little room was lit by the electric blue of a death that had touched him from nearly a thousand miles distant.

The way Baldacci so easily describes scenes, events and characters and builds up to the climax makes him a real thriller master. The rest of those in attendance began straggling away, some flicking nods and glances and sad smiles his way. He had proved Mars’s innocence, and Mars had received a substantial financial windfall for his wrongful incarceration. Close friends and neighbours in the community apparently heard nothing, and Cummins’ distraught ex-husband, Barry, and teenage son, Tyler, both have strong alibis. This can be an effective storytelling device, but in this case, waiting for the private investigator heroine to get to where the reader is at the beginning of the story feels interminable.He felt a nudge on his hand and opened his eyes to see Sandy’s small, slender fingers curling around his long, thick ones.